Israel's parliament delayed a crucial Budget vote yesterday to allow time for last-ditch negotiations to avert a government collapse over funding for Jewish settlements.
The center-left Labour party threatened to vote against next year's state spending plan and leave right-wing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's broad coalition government over its provisions for settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
"This gives new hope for a solution so the national unity government will continue to function," coalition chairman Zeev Boim of Sharon's Likud party told Israel Radio after the vote was put off by four hours.
If Labour pulls out, Sharon would face the prospect of early elections and building a narrow right-wing government in the interim, with no end in sight to a two-year-old Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.
In fresh violence, a Palestinian gunman infiltrated a Jewish settlement in the northern West Bank late on Tuesday and killed two girls and a woman before being shot dead by soldiers.
The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which is linked to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction, claimed responsibility in a telephone call for the attack in Hermesh settlement.
The attack underscored the gamble behind Labour's threat to leave at a time when it faces waning support among voters.
Opinion polls show a majority of Israelis still want a "national unity" government to combat the uprising, the possible repercussions of a mooted US strike on Iraq and a worsening domestic recession.
Israel's crisis could also upset the US goal of reducing Middle East violence to court Arab support for its campaign to disarm Iraq.
But Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer, the Labour chief who had demanded that some 700 million shekels (US$145 million) budgeted for settlers be redirected to Israel's poor, hinted at a possible compromise yesterday.
Lawyers for Labour and Likud said a proposed compromise would put off a final resolution of the settlement funding row for two weeks in return for Labour's support of the Budget in its first reading yesterday.
UPDATED (3:40pm): A suspected gas explosion at a shopping mall in Taichung this morning has killed four people and injured 20 others, as emergency responders continue to investigate. The explosion occurred on the 12th floor of the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi in Situn District (西屯) at 11:33am. One person was declared dead at the scene, while three people were declared deceased later after receiving emergency treatment. Another 20 people sustained major or minor injuries. The Taichung Fire Bureau said it received a report of the explosion at 11:33am and sent rescuers to respond. The cause of the explosion is still under investigation, it said. The National Fire
ACCOUNTABILITY: The incident, which occured at a Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Department Store in Taichung, was allegedly caused by a gas explosion on the 12th floor Shin Kong Group (新光集團) president Richard Wu (吳昕陽) yesterday said the company would take responsibility for an apparent gas explosion that resulted in four deaths and 26 injuries at Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Zhonggang Store in Taichung yesterday. The Taichung Fire Bureau at 11:33am yesterday received a report saying that people were injured after an explosion at the department store on Section 3 of Taiwan Boulevard in Taichung’s Situn District (西屯). It sent 56 ambulances and 136 paramedics to the site, with the people injured sent to Cheng Ching Hospital’s Chung Kang Branch, Wuri Lin Shin Hospital, Taichung Veterans General Hospital or Chung
‘TAIWAN-FRIENDLY’: The last time the Web site fact sheet removed the lines on the US not supporting Taiwanese independence was during the Biden administration in 2022 The US Department of State has removed a statement on its Web site that it does not support Taiwanese independence, among changes that the Taiwanese government praised yesterday as supporting Taiwan. The Taiwan-US relations fact sheet, produced by the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, previously stated that the US opposes “any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means.” In the updated version published on Thursday, the line stating that the US does not support Taiwanese independence had been removed. The updated
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